


good enough

by thestarsaretalking



Series: i think it's finally safe for me to fall [5]
Category: Space Force (TV)
Genre: Angst, Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Past Relationship(s), chan and tony both deserve hugs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-13
Updated: 2020-09-13
Packaged: 2021-03-06 14:20:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,251
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26430283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thestarsaretalking/pseuds/thestarsaretalking
Summary: Chan and Tony confront Tony’s ex-boyfriend, who hasn’t quite gotten over his break up with Tony, and they come to some realizations.
Relationships: Chan Kaifang & F. Tony Scarapiducci, Chan Kaifang/F. Tony Scarapiducci
Series: i think it's finally safe for me to fall [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1884013
Comments: 8
Kudos: 21





	good enough

**Author's Note:**

> as you’re reading this, keep in mind that steve looks like michael cera and stan is like a manly sexy ben wyatt and no i don't know why either
> 
> this fic is dedicated to my dear friend stan the man on twitter thank you for ur endless support, encouragement, and kindness <3 also i put michael cera in per ur request

“Do I really have to do this? I could probably be doing better things with my time,” Chan grumbled as he, Naird, Tony, and Mallory waited for the investors to arrive. 

Naird nodded his head firmly and clasped his hands behind his back. “You have to. Some of our investors are professional scientists so we need you and Mallory to impress them with your scientific knowledge.” 

“Plus, you get to spend the day with me!” Tony exclaimed, wrapping an arm around Chan’s shoulders and bringing him closer. 

Tony’s enthusiasm made Chan break into a grin and Chan caved, “That’s true. I guess this won’t be a waste of my time.” 

While Naird scrunched up his nose in disgust at the couple’s PDA, Mallory chuckled affectionately, “Ah, young love.” 

After wasting unnecessary money, the Space Force desperately needed some funding so the government roped in a couple of investors to help out. The investors, of course, wanted to see what exactly they would be investing in before they made any decisions so a tour was set up to show the investors around the Space Force base. 

“Here they come,” Naird informed through gritted teeth as a group of rich-looking people wearing suits were approaching them. 

Tony pointed at a man with short brown hair and a mustache and raised an eyebrow. “Who’s that Michael Cera-looking motherfucker?” 

“That’s Steve Jones. He’s not a ‘Michael Cera-looking motherfucker’, he’s a very powerful man and we need his money,” Naird pushed Tony’s hand down and gave him a condescending glare. 

Chan nodded, staring at the tall, lanky man standing next to Steve Jones, who looked like a shrimp when he walked next to the man. “Well, that explains why he has a bodyguard.” 

When Tony saw the man, his smile melted off his face as he recognized him. “That’s no bodyguard. That’s Stanley Beningo. He must be Steve’s social media manager.” 

“Wait, how do you know him?” Chan frowned, trying to recall if he had ever seen Stanley before. Stanley looked vaguely familiar but only because he was a white guy with brown hair. 

Tony lowered his voice as the group of investors drew closer and closer. “He’s my ex from college. Well, technically, we didn’t go to the same college. He went to Columbia, which was pretty close to NYU, and we dated for, like, a year but it wasn’t  _ that _ serious. I’m sure he doesn’t even remember me.” 

“Fuck Tony, is that you?” Stanley called and Tony winced. 

“Or maybe not,” Tony mumbled under his breath before he raised his throat and faked a smile. “Hey, Stan! So good to see you.” 

Chan couldn’t tell whether he was just being paranoid or not but he thought that Stan’s eyes were scanning Tony’s body, obviously checking Tony out, and he went into defense mode. He purposefully held Tony’s hand and cleared his throat, drawing Stan’s attention towards him. Stan, who hadn’t looked at Chan earlier, glanced down at Chan’s hands and forced an obviously strained grin. “Who’s this guy?” 

“Hi, I’m Dr. Chan, Tony’s boyfriend. Nice to meet you. You should pay attention to the presentation.” Chan gestured towards Naird, who was telling the investors about the missions Space Force had launched. The investors seemed to all be scrutinizing the general as he spoke and Chan was glad that he wasn’t in charge of making up some bullshit to convince investors that Space Force was worth the investment. 

Despite maintaining the plastic smile on his face, Stan glared daggers at Chan and turned towards Naird to pay attention to the information Naird was giving. Chan inched a little closer to Tony and whispered in a low voice, “What is it with you and dating social media managers? Do you guys have a dating pact or something?” 

“How was I supposed to know Stan would become a social media manager? Also, I kissed Hannah once. Once. That doesn’t count as dating,” Tony hissed out of the corner of his mouth. Chan shook his head but squeezed Tony’s hand a little tighter as if to remind himself that whatever happened in the past didn’t matter. 

As the tour started, Chan noticed that Stan was clearly trying to get closer to Tony. Stan was constantly cracking jokes and standing close to Tony as if doing so would somehow make Tony want him back. Chan was silently seething at Stan during the entire time and his frustration finally bubbled over when they reached the control room and Stan thought it would be funny to point at one of the buttons on the control panel and ask, “What does that button do? Blow up the world?” 

“Actually, Stan, it doesn’t,” Chan loudly answered and all eyes turned towards him. He knew that he shouldn’t let his pride get the best of him when there were literally millions of dollars at risk, but he was just so tired of Stan that he wanted the excuse to absolutely wreck him. “That button opens up radio channels for foreign communications. You know how you hear stories of people accidentally launching nuclear bombs? Pressing that button at the wrong time would be like accidentally dropping a verbal nuke on hundreds of countries around the world and we take that shit seriously. I don’t think you’d want to be personally responsible for pissing off millions of people so it would be a good idea to keep your hands to yourself.” 

There was a brief moment of silence after Chan finished talking, and for a moment, he was worried that he just scared off all of the potential investors. While Stan looked like somebody had just spat on his grandmother’s grave, Tony looked oddly proud as if he enjoyed watching Chan verbally tear Stan to pieces. 

“I like this guy. He knows what he’s talking about,” called out an investor. The rest of the investors nodded and hummed in agreement, jotting down notes with smiles on their faces, and Chan let out a breath of relief, glad that his brief rant hadn’t frightened the investors. Tony flashed Chan a thumbs-up and Chan broke into a smile. 

For the rest of the tour, Chan felt victorious, having one-upped Stan at the unspoken game they were playing together. That was until he had to leave the tour towards its end because he and Mallory had to double-check the status of the calculations for the next mission. Chan didn’t think that anything eventful would happen while he was gone for five minutes but he was sorely mistaken.

The moment Chan was out of earshot, Stan dropped to one knee in front of Tony, who had nearly dropped his phone in shock. “Whoa, Stan, what are you doing?” 

“What does it look like I’m doing?” Stan asked as he pulled a ring box out from his expensive-looking jacket. All the investors gasped when they saw Stan open the box to reveal a sparkling ring, and even Naird stopped speaking to gawk at the sight of Stan proposing to Tony. 

Tony tugged on Stan’s arm, trying to get him to stand up. “Stan, get up. You’re embarrassing yourself! Don’t do this.” 

But no matter how much Tony tried to get Stan to budge, Stan stood, or rather, kneeled, his ground. He plowed on despite Tony’s discontent and the investor’s shock. “Tony, I know we broke up years ago but I’ve never stopped thinking about you. Remember when we made out under that statue at 2 am in the middle of winter? We were both freezing but from that moment on, I knew you were the only one for me.” 

Having given up on trying to get Stan to stand up, Tony dropped his hands and sighed loudly. “Stan, we were both drunk and stupid. We only dated for a year.” 

Stan ignored Tony’s protests and continued with passion burning in his warm brown eyes. “I love you so much, Tony. I know you have a boyfriend now but that doesn’t matter. I’m so much better than him. What does he have to offer? Some knowledge about how buttons in a control center work? You can do so much better than him. You can have me. So, what do you say? Will you marry me?” 

Just as Stan started trash-talking Chan, Dr. Chan and Mallory returned to the chaotic scene. Tony glanced at Chan and his face fell when he realized that his boyfriend had seen the entire ordeal. Chan stared back vacantly, overwhelmed by all the emotions washing over him like waves, and when Tony took the ring from the box, Chan felt like somebody had grabbed his heart and furiously shoved a thousand knives into it. 

Tony examined the ring for a second while everybody held in their breaths, waiting for his answer. Then, his fingers closed around the ring and he threw the ring as far as he could across the atrium before turning back to Stan and shouting, “What the fuck, dude? You’re a psycho! I can’t believe you actually proposed to me and thought that I would leave my boyfriend for you. What is wrong with you?” 

Stan’s mouth opened and closed repeatedly as he tried to find some words to excuse his behavior but Tony’s patience wore thin. 

“Actually, you know what? Save it. I don’t want to hear whatever you’re going to say. We’re getting out of here.” Tony grabbed Chan’s hand and led him out of the door. Naird, Mallory, and the investors were too stunned by what had just happened to stop them from leaving early. 

Strangely enough, as Tony dragged him into the parking lot, Chan’s only thought was “Mallory’s going to be pissed at Tony tomorrow”. Then, when he got into the passenger's seat, Chan seemed to finally regain consciousness as he heard Tony ramble. 

“I can’t believe Stan’s nerve? Like who does he think he is? Does he think he can just waltz in here and try to win me back with a very expensive and nice-looking ring?” Tony punched the start button on the car and the engine came to life. “No, obviously not. I’m sure he’s rich and all but that was a total dick move. I never thought that he would-” 

“Maybe he’s right,” Chan said in a quiet voice. Tony barely heard him utter the words over the sound of the car but he turned off the engine and faced Chan. 

“What?” 

Chan sat up a little straighter and looked Tony in the eyes. “I said maybe Stan’s right. You deserve somebody better than me.”

“No. Okay, no. That’s not true. Chan, listen, you are more than enough, okay? I love you so much, please don’t think for a second that I would ever leave you for that skanky excuse of an asshole,” Tony earnestly stated as he placed his hands on Chan’s shoulders. “Social media managers are fake as fuck and we’re all assholes so don’t think for a second that you’re worse than any of us.”

“Wait, you think you’re an asshole?” Chan’s mouth dropped open slightly, surprised to hear what Tony thought of himself. Tony had always carried himself as a very confident person, even when he opened up to Chan. Chan knew that Tony had some insecurities but he never knew that Tony thought of himself as an outright asshole.

“That’s not the point but yeah. I thought we already established that.” Tony didn’t seem too bothered by his negative self-perception but Chan seemed very concerned about it.

“Tony, you’re not an asshole. I know people probably tell you otherwise but Tony, you’re one of the most genuine people on this planet and you aren’t an asshole, I promise.” Chan’s voice was filled with such honesty and care that Tony caved in to the belief that he was actually worth something.

Joy crossed Tony’s face as he responded, “Thank you. That means a lot to me. Also, I guess we both had things we’ve been worried about that we never really said to each other.”

“Yeah, I guess so. But I’m glad we had this talk,” Chan smiled at Tony as Tony started the car again. Tony grinned back and they drove back home, far from Stan.

Later that evening, Tony got a call from Naird who yelled at Tony for five minutes straight about walking out of the base and then conceding that Tony’s somewhat heroic act led to many of the investors on the tour to agree to invest in Space Force.

By the time Tony got off the phone with Naird, Chan was already fast asleep on the couch. Michael was curled up on his lap, licking his paws lazily as he watched the show playing on the TV. Tony lowered the volume of the TV until the voices of the characters were a dull drone in the background and draped a blanket across Chan before he settled down on the couch and opened his laptop.

He remembered the name of the jewelry company that was engraved in the inside of the ring Stan had tried to propose with and typed it into the search bar. When Tony found the website, he was surprised by the wide variety of rings available and decided that he would go to the store in-person the next day to check them out

But at that moment, Tony was content with closing his laptop and carrying Chan bridal-style back to their bedroom before falling asleep with the love of his life in his arms.

**Author's Note:**

> pls leave a comment or a kudo on your way out!


End file.
